Special Conditions - Kensington - Electrical Work query

schuey87

I have a joint mortgageicon with Kensington (we went with non high street as my wife had an old default from a mobile phone company when someone stole her phone to call Nigeria and she negotiated a reduced amount to pay with the company and ended up with a default without being told she would by negotiating the reduced amount... but that's another story!)

Anyway, we have been in the house for 6 months, no problems with payments or anything like that. One of our original mortgageicon conditions when we purchased the house was:
"The Borrower(s) undertake to carry out the following works: upgrade the electrical system (and to promptly lodge any relevant guarantees with us) within 6 months of Completion of the loan. Written confirmation of this undertaking signed by all Borrower(s) must be forwarded to Kensington prior to formal completion. Failure to carry out the relevant works may adversely affect your insurance cover and any future claims you may make under your policy."

We had to get an survey done before moving into the house which we got done, and a quote from the company doing the survey for the work. Both of these were forwarded to the mortgage company along with an undertaking that we signed at the solicitors. (I don't know what the wording of the undertaking was as the solicitor is closed today and they didn't give us a copy of that, but I could find out on Monday). The survey found several problems and the quote to have it all sorted was £1500.

We saved the money to pay for the work and got it booked with the company who did the survey. The company was booked to do the work about 2 weeks before the 6 months post completion. 6 months post completion passes today. The company booked to do the work rang us up 2 days before they were due to come and do the work to cancel, saying they had got a big contract that they couldn't turn down and they wouldn't have any time to come do our work and couldn't recommend anyone else.

So I had a look around, found a few electricians with good reviews and got a couple of them to come have a look. They have basically told me that the original company who we got the survey done with were completely ripping us off. There are a couple of points on the survey that would need sorting but they were all minor points that would take no more than 1/2 a day and £100 or so. All of the technical test results in the survey show the system is fine and completely safe. Even the minor things that were listed on the survey should not have been listed on the survey as dangerous as they were by the original company. Some of the items listed are completely made up, or the work recommended is actually done already when inspected!

So that leaves us now in the position of having to talk to the mortgage company and work out what to do. Unfortunately they are closed today so I will have to speak to them on Monday. However, from our dealings with them up until completion they proved a VERY awkward company to deal with, and I have no confidence that this is going to be as easy to fix as it should be. One option I was thinking of was to get another survey report from one of the electricians I have had come look at the work, get those little bits of work done that do need doing and see if Kensington will be happy with a new report stating no further work is required and the installation is all safe. That would cost me about £200 as opposed to the £1500 originally quoted.

I remember when we were at the solicitors they told us most mainstream mortgage companies never follow up conditions like this, but given how awkward Kensington were to deal with I expect they will!

I'm not entirely sure where I stand on these special conditions. What rights do the mortgage company have if we don't meet a condition such as that one or they want to be awkward about it and make out we haven't met it? We don't have insurance with Kensington, we have separate buildings and contents insuranceicon so I can't see how that caveat about insurance works. Are there any other solutions anyone can think of? I do actually have the money to spend £1500 if it comes to it, but it seems outrageous that I will have to do it to please the mortgage company when it is completely unnecessary work and all based on a company's report that decided to rip us off!